The growth of cells of great practical interest, such as, the filamentous cells of bacterium Streptomyces clavuligerus, the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae and the insect Spodoptera frugiperda (Sf9) cell, cultivated in shaking flasks with complex media at appropriate temperatures and pHs, was quantified by the new wavelet transform technique. This image analysis tool was implemented using Matlab 5.2 software to process digital images acquired of samples taken of these three types of cells throughoot their cultivation. The values of the average wavelet coefficients (AWCs) of simplified images were compared with experimental measurements of cell concentration and with computer-based densitometric measurements. AWCs were shown to be directly proportional to measurements of cell concentration and to densitometric measurements, making evident the great potential of the wavelet transform technique to quantitatively estimate the growth of several types of cells.
Image analysis; Wavelet transform; Streptomyces clavuligerus; Saccharomyces cerevisiae; Spodoptera frugiperda; Cell growth
